Every realization has a story behind, and mine is no different. Life is always ambiguous. But one thing which is straight and simple is that it does not believe in favouritism. Opportunities are thrown at one and all, but it totally depends on us how we handle it (with care). We aspire to have a highly flamboyant lifestyle with some added fame, exactly like the extra cheese on our Pizza. In this process we often lead a very cosmetic life – creating a society of affluence and greed. Do we actually desire a moderate life..?? I’m sure none of us do. But why? Even after achieving a comfortable level of financial security, we don’t stop, we aspire/desire/want/crave for more. Strange is the human psychology.
Someone once told me we can maximize our happiness by minimizing two habits –expectations and comparisons. Expectations end up hurting your own self and comparisons create jealousy. Life is not as long as we think it is. Why do we waste it on useless and mindless activities like, complaining, backstabbing and hurting one another?
Human beings are bound to create relationships; we cannot deny our basic instincts. We are social animals; relationships are an inevitable component of our existence. There are Ups and Downs in every relationship; how we control and manage it totally depends on us -whether we would like to follow a ‘Forgive & Forget’ policy or whether we would keep on building negative emotions and grudges against each other. The choice is on us.
Did anybody say Life will always be rewarding? Then why do we expect every relation to be like Lake Placid?? Past is a grave and the future is unknown. Living in the present moment is what can yield positive results. Again, the choice is ours. Simply pondering over past miseries and not learning lessons will make us cling to the past in sadness. It is only when we wisely embrace the lessons that we let go of the past and move on in life to brighten our present. My granddad had taught me this Golden line – “We need to know the commas and full-stops of life.” We need to exactly know where to pause and where to stop in life.
There’s absolutely no Rule Book for creating a content life, then why are we still searching for one?
The Bluestocker 
Three cheers!!!
❤ thanx RV
Well Ritu, the striking points are expectations & comparisons and really your commas & full stop makes a very good sense to all if they seriously think about their life…..keep that good work going and keep me in the loop whenever you post some of your good thoughts.
Regards
Niladri
good point. infact , bang on! to live a nice , happy life , we dont need much. thats the best thing about life . its important , i guess , to realize it and to stand up for it . its important for us , to realize it just HOW MUCH is important for us. Once that is defined , we should be happy with it. as kids , we think , fast cars bring lots of happiness. but , in life , we evolve and we realize , thats not gives us happiness. its simple things like being with your family and having a good time. happiness is the key , the rest shall follow. If someone is honest to himself , I believe , in the end, he usually wins!!
wonderfully written. an excellent food for thought. yes, expectations bring frustrations and comparisons rope in jealousy. my granddad always said “simple living, high thinking”. well both brothers had a similar philosophy because of the common upbringing.
yes life is very similar to the peaks and troughs of economics and being content with life (controlling ourselves in times of success and accepting defeat during failures) may be a way to reach the median of the graph! as u have already said if we can accept that past is grave and future is unknown, living a controlled life in the present may be a formula to a “successful” life!
well… truly speaking, there are no such rule-book to govern us in any field of work and yet we need and give to ourselves imaginary laws to lead us to achieve our goals in a guided path …… these are self-imposed to get us focused. But at the end it is onto us and us alone to perform and govern our lives..
Well said and well thoughts, Ritu …. keep writing !!
Great words and an excellent composition Ritu 🙂 Keep it up !!!
Certainly good healthy realization for one’s grey matter.
Expectations and comparisons!!?? Oopps!!
Guess we all are blessed to have these two Hutch dogs following us all along…
It all starts with whom we resemble more – mom or, dad when we are born; gets tougher when it comes down to school/college rankings; toughest when both of them pounces on you during your adulthood…
No escape boss!! No escape from this!!
Its an endless run to meet the aspirations of your predecessors …. guess where the run ends??
….till you start aspiring your life’s “couldn’t dos” from your successors….
….and the loop continues….
In between; chhota mota realizations come up and get reviewed 😉
Nicely said “we can maximize our happiness by minimizing two habits –expectations and comparisons”.
However, I believe most of us do have these realizations but could not implement in our daily life. It is not we don’t want to, it is for we don’t leave in an ideal society or world to implement these.
Implementation of these “extremely good” concepts also need lots of training and practice for a long time (unless we born with those qualities) with an ideal environment. As you already said life is too small, so the time to realize these so called little “extremely good” concepts from the practical world and implement them in true sense at our own life could not happen always.
Many time we also don’t do many things for us, rather we do it for some one else to make their life secure and happy in this world, e.g., parents do often to secure their children’s life.
So, most of these terms are pretty relative and end of the day the naked truth of this world is “survival of the fittest”. After all if we survive we could try to follow the good concepts in life.
What say 😀
hey ritu
good one. i thought i am back in Imdr!!!!!!!
I really liked the expectations and comparison thing. must say written very nicely.
shabnam
very nicely pointed out jhulondi…. we live a life that is too cosmetic.. today truth is forsaken and a bit of show business has crept on to our very lives as we tend to market ourselves with brands, prices and company. forgetting the very basic: who we are…..
Wonderfully written.. I love this.. I always wonder how can people gather all the thoughts and make an awesome article of aspirations and realizations.. I simply love it.
Great going Ritu..
Keep it up.
Ani.
very well written, the examples are so apt, the mind is full of questions about ones own lfe and the way it has been lead, after the first read. Well done! Keep writing!
I never miss reading any of your articles.Really a good piece.Onekdin por likhli je?I really agree with what you have said,expectations should always be controlled to lead a happy and peaceful life
Nice one.But,how many of us can understand and actually follow ?Or may be all would had become saints if they did !!
Nice yar